After we surfed on the Internet, we found many “no sky” streets of other forms. Some of them are local streets in Taiwan and others are foreign streets. The extra construction of these streets was different but they have one thing in common: their extra construction aimed to reinforce the commercial function of the streets. Now let’s see some interesting examples.

Taiwan

Shihding Old Street

      There is an old street located in Shihding in northern Taiwan. The old street is divided into East Street and West Street by Fushou Bridge. West street was the passage for the transportation of tea in the past and was once very prosperous. There were two hotels and one theater in the street. On the other hand, East Street was built only Wutuku Creak and used to be a gathering place for beggars. It was called “beggar’s hut”. Diaojiao Building in East Street is a well-known local “no sky” street house.

East Street

      It used to be called Neiyuezih. It was developed later than west street. During the early years of development, Shihding was the center of tea transactions. Due to the narrow land, people started to live in east street and began the development of east street. The residences developed the special architecture form“Diaojiao building”to solve the problem of narrow land and thus made the special landscape of “no sky”. The so-called “Diaojiao Building” refers to the local “no sky” street house there. The houses are above the river and were supported by pillars only. The “no sky”architecture form is two floor, including the house and street downstairs.

Fenci Old Street

     Fenci Lake, located in southern Taiwan, is a famous middle stop of the forest railway in Alishan. It was famous for the old street, lunch box, and square bamboos. The town, which is 1045 meters above sea level, is a low-lying lands with its three faces surrounded by mountains. It looks like a dustpan. It is also called Dustpan Lake because it is surrounded by clouds and fog and looks like a lake.

         The houses in Fenci Lake were built along the hill. There is an 500-meter-long old street beneath the train station. The stores in the street sell special products of the place, for example, local lunch boxes, Tofu, and cookies and attract lots of tourist to purchase them. The store owners built extra roofs to block the rain and wind and formed “no sky”. The old street in Fenci Lake beneath the train station didn’t have a street name and local people called it “Street”. It is the place that the stores of Fenci Lake first gathered.

　　　Lots of old houses in the Fenci old street were burn in a couple of years ago, and some of the house were torn down for building fire prevention alley. The scale of old street today is not as large as it used to be, and what we see are the outcome of rebuilding the street.